The Camera Notes
Keeping notes is essential to the orderly mind and to the orderly collection.
I have never had a great memory
and it is getting worse as I age.
I developed the habit years
ago of keeping notebooks. I
have one for house repairs, a couple
for travel planning, and several for
subects of interest that I research. And so you can imagine that I have notebooks for my camera collecting. I page number them and at the end of each I create indicies for my camera notebooks to that point. That way I can go back to any subject I want to review.
When the spirit moves me to post in my blogs these books are the basis of those posts. I should post more often but that distracts me from my photography and collecting. There is just not time for everything. However I do hope you find these scratchings to be of interest.
The Camera Notes are strictly about the tecnichal aspects of cameras. If you are interested in my thoughts generally on art and photography then check out the Joy of Light on the top menu. Very little about cameras there: just photography.
How to be a Better Photographer
The Brownie Hawkeye is a simple box camera introduced by Kodak in 1949. It was fixed focus, fixed iris, fixed shutter speed. And it worked just fine. To aim the camera you looked into the viewfinder, the lens on top, and saw the scene through the top lens on the...
Creme de la Nikon
Well, yes, I know this is supposed to be about Canon. But sometimes we have to take a side trip to gain some perspective. And this particular piece of news is a tad discouraging as a collector. But I have always known there will be lots of cameras I will never be able...
Vancouver Camera Show
I like camera shows. I'm new to them. My first was this past spring and just last Sunday I was at my most recent. After four shows I am beginning to know people and I'm starting to really enjoy getting together with guys who like what I like and "talk shop". The...
Shutter Tester
Old cameras are not worth a great deal in most cases. I am buying FT's and FTb's at US camera shows for $5.00 to $10.00 dollars. It makes no sense to have them serviced when you can acquire them so cheaply. Even paying $100.00 for a camera does not make repair...
Pellix Redux
So, here we are back talking about the Pellix. Well, at least I am. If I am boring you, I apologise. You will recall that I was out shooting with my Pellix earlier and I had a problem with the light seals on the back of the camera and I got fogged film. We then...
Using the Industar 22
Industar 22 Collapsible We talked earlier about my cleaning my Russian Industar 22 Collapsible lens. That operation appeared successful but I was anxious to try it out. I was concerned that my repair worked and also what effect the obvious small scratches on the lens...
Cleaning the Industar-22
I recently acquired a Zorki 1b camera and it came with an Industar-22 50mm f/3.5 collapsible lens. This lens seemed to be in good to very good condition but the iris diaphragm was not working. There was no visible damage and so it was pretty sure to be solidified...
Replacing Light Seals
You may recall that I had a problem when I went out to shoot some film in one of my Pellix cameras. The light seals had deteriorated and turned to goo or had crumbled away and the film became fogged in the camera. This was a problem with the foam used by Canon in the...
Why am I Shooting Film?
The Canon EF is a lovely camera to shoot, although it is more work than a modern Digital SLR. All of the pictures on this post were taken with this camera pictured. It began as a desire to try out some of my old cameras and to revisit a world I left back in the...
A Walk with the Canon Pellix
Taking out my old cameras , like my Canon Pellix, for a photo walk has become a bit of a surprise. I thought I was just going to take a walk down memory lane and reconnect with my days of picture taking in the 50’s and 60’s. But it is fast becoming much more than...
